JOIN USFormer BJP chief Nitin Gadkari, ex-chief minister of Himachal Pradesh Shanta Kumar, party’s deputy leader in Lok Sabha Gopinath Munde and Yuva Morcha chief Anurag Thakur are among the 54 names in BJP’s first list of candidates released late on Thursday for Lok Sabha polls.
The party has nominated two Muslim candidates in Jammu and Kashmir—Gulam Mohammad Mir in Baramulla and Mushtaq Ahmad Malik Nurabadi in Anantnag constituencies.
The list released after a meeting of the party’s Central Election Committee, covers eight states and includes six SCs and six STs, four minorities and two women.
While Gadkari will contest the Nagpur Lok Sabha seat, Munde will be in fray in his Beed seat in Maharashtra and in Himachal Pradesh Shanta Kumar will be trying his luck from Kangra and Thakur in Hamirpur.
The party’s Central Election Committee finalised the list after two hours of deliberations at the BJP headquarters where top leaders like Narendra Modi, L K Advani, Rajnath Singh, Sushma Swaraj, Arun Jaitley, Murli Manohar Joshi and M Venkaiah Naidu were present.